Flemingsberg Campus expanding

A new research centre is planned at Karolinska Institutet's Campus Flemingsberg. An agreement was signed at the turn of the year to start the project. If all goes according to plan, the centre will be completed in 2017, next to a similar centre being built for KTH. But that is not the only thing that is happening here.

Several premises along Alfred Nobel allé and Novum are to be reviewed and rebuilt. The aim is to create a concentrated learning environment and a more efficient use of resources and facilities. The plans are called “Vision Huddinge”.

The new joint Research Centre for Karolinska Institutet and AstraZeneca - Integrated Cardio Metabolic Centre (KI/AZ ICMC) are also based at Huddinge. Up to six research groups are now being recruited here with a total of 20 to 30 researchers in cardiovascular and metabolic diseases from AstraZeneca and Karolinska Institutet.

Other projects are not as far advanced: The Future Lab project is in the starting blocks and concerns how the premises on Alfred Nobels väg 8, where the Department of Dentistry and Department of Laboratory Medicine are mainly housed today, can be rebuilt and be perceived as a more modern research centre. An important consideration in the preparatory work is that the goal must be that every machine should be harnessed and used by the researchers, another is that “where there are researchers, there must also be students.”

How things will eventually turn out remains unclear.

“When the review of the departments is complete, they will be joint workshops,” says Peter Allestam, Project Manager at the Property Section at Karolinska Institutet.

In the Zanderska building on Alfred Nobel allé 23, the Health Promotion Unit is to be grouped and more lecture rooms are now also being converted in line with the “Learning Environment” concept . The premises will be more inviting and welcoming to students.

However, the biggest project is the new research building planned diagonally in front of the Karolinska University Hospital, which is getting a sister building with KTH and the Red Cross College as tenants.

Just before the turn of the year we signed an agreement to start on the new building between Karolinska Institutet and TKV Fastighets AB, which has been commissioned to draw up programmes and system documentation. Thereafter, the parties are to agree on rent levels and present the project to the highest instance, the Board of Karolinska Institutet, which has to decide if it will be a reality.

With a floor space of 15,000 square metres, and just as the Biomedicum research centre on the Solna campus, an ultra-modern facility for experimental research is planned, and Biomedicum will also be significantly larger with its 55,000 square metres.

In addition to KI, KTH, Södertörn University and the Red Cross College, the Police Academy will also be moving in to the campus Flemingsberg.